Crooked Kingdom By Leigh Bardugo Novels & Stories

It was the past clawing its way out — her family’s oath, reborn in secret. Footsteps echoed behind her. Luca’s voice came, low and tired. “You shouldn’t be here.” She turned to him, eyes glowing with cold defiance. “Neither should you. But we both have ghosts to answer to.” He took a slow breath. “What did you find?” She looked back at the crest, her expression unreadable. “Proof that everything we built was built on a lie.” He stepped closer, blood still on his shirt, and for a heartbeat, they stood there — the King and Queen of a crumbling kingdom, caught between love and legacy.

If she perished, then so too did the only bridge between dragons and men he could still imagine. He returned to Qombinia bearing two corpses: King Rhaedon’s broken armor and Queen Lythissa’s sunstone crown. The court lowered its eyes, for the last remnant of mercy in their king drained away like blood from a mortal wound. Drakonios swore before the Obsidian Flame: I will scourge every realm that raised arms this day. I will make ashes of their palaces and dust of their names. And so the old, kind Drakonios vanished, replaced by the merciless monarch known in whispers as the Heartless King.

My father may have tried to rule the realm and become a dictator, wanting to reshape the realm in his own image but somewhere deep down for all his faults, he was nowhere close to being as evil as Aodh is. If Aodh defeated us, the realm as we know it would cease to exist. I found the strength to pull myself to my knees, watching Leneve cross the ravine heading for Yggdrasil. I couldn’t let another member of my family get hurt. Like a sweeping dark cloud of dust, Leneve released the darkness inside her instantly causing the reanimated dark army to perish. If she could find the strength, so could I. I reach down deep inside, my mind on Hunji and my brothers. Seeing the state of the other knigh

Nikolai’s hand tightened on my waist, his body going rigid with barely leashed violence. I stepped forward before he could respond, chin high, voice calm and laced with steel. “Collateral was a long time ago, Mr. Krov. I am Liora Volkov—his queen and partner. And I’m here because this concerns my daughter’s life as much as your territories. Shall we waste time on outdated insults, or discuss how we both bleed Elias dry?” A beat of silence. Then Sergei’s lips twitched into something almost like respect. He gestured to the seats. “Bold. Sit.”

You came for the record. Elara’s heart dropped. The Ledger of Cinder wasn't a vial of air. It was a book. It was the master list of every soul Korth had ever collected, containing the secret locations of where the bodies were buried and the bloodlines they left behind. If someone had that book, they could find the heirs to every fallen kingdom in the world. They could start a hundred wars with a single page. "The Prince doesn't just want Oakhaven," Elara realized, her voice trembling with anger. "He wants the world."

Below them, the city was a carpet of lights, oblivious to the tragedy 900 feet in the air. "The lullabies were a lie, Elena," Madeline said, her back to her daughter. "The only truth is the Crown. The Broken Crown isn't just an organization. It’s a philosophy. We destroy the old world to make room for the new one. And Leo… Leo is the foundation of the new world."

A priest in dark robes lifted a silver bowl filled with burning herbs that smelled sharp and bitter. “The kingdom is fire,” he intoned. “Fire,” the court echoed. “The king is its shield.” “Shield.” “Loyalty is the blood that binds stone and sky.” “Loyalty.” Elowen resisted the urge to roll his eyes. Human rituals had a flair for the dramatic. Corvin stood with one palm resting lightly on the hilt of his sword: not tense, not relaxed, simply ready. His jet-black hair fell in loose waves now, the lamplight catching along its edges like dark glass. He looked carved from calm fury.